East of Lacock village lies a great barn which serves two purposes. It is
the entrance to Lacock Abbey, owned by the National Trust, and houses a museum
for the work of William Henry Fox Talbot, one of the 19th century owners of
Lacock and the pioneer of negative based photography in the 1840s.

The ground floor of the mansion is based on buildings of the original Augustinian
Nunnery and includes a cloister, chapter house and warming room. Photography
is allowed in this section. The Nunnery was founded by Ela Countess of Salisbury
in 1232. She was the daughter of William, Earl of Salisbury, and her great,
great grandfather, Edward of Salisbury was the owner of the Manor of Lacock
at the time of the Domesday survey in 1086. Ela was born in Amesbury in 1188
and on her father's death in 1196 she inherited great wealth. Her mother took
her to France for safekeeping but two years later she returned and as was the
custom of the time, as an heiress she was made a ward of the King. This enabled
Richard I to marry the heiress to his stepbrother, William Longspee or Longsword,
the illegitimate son of Henry II and Rosamund Clifford. William became through
his marriage the Earl of Salisbury. The marriage took place in 1198. William
went on the Crusade but eventually returned and became one of the witnesses
of the Magna Carta in the reign of King John. William and Ela laid the fourth
and fifth foundation stones of Salisbury Cathedral. William was the first person
to be buried there in 1226 and Ela founded two religious houses in his memory
on the same day. One was for Carthusian monks at Hinton Charterhouse and the
other at Lacock for Augustinian Canonesses. In 1238, Ela became a nun and in
1241 became the first Abbess of Lacock. She died in 1261 and was buried under
the high altar of the abbey church.

At the Dissolution in 1539, the abbey was acquired for £763 by William
Sharrington (c. 1495-1558) who had made a fortune as Vice Treasurer of the Mint
in Bristol by reducing coin sizes and pocketing the difference. He was knighted
at the coronation of Edward VI. The church was pulled down, and the remainder
was modified into a dwelling with the addition of stable courtyard, brewery
and and octagonal tower. He spent 2,000 marks on the house in addition to the
purchase price. The original nunnery walls were surrounded by new buildings
in an Italianate style then gaining in popularity. In the late 18th century
much of the abbey was modified to the Palladian style.

Sir William Sharrington was closely associated with Thomas Seymour who as Earl
of Somerset acted as Protector during the first part of the reign of Edward
VI (1547-1553). Somerset was accused of treason and executed whereas Sharrington
was allowed to purchase his freedom for £8,000 and subsequently regained
his property. Sharrington died in 1566 and his tomb is in the Lady Chapel of
the parish church. He married three times but had no son so the estate proceeded
via his brother's daughter who married into the Talbot family of Shropshire,
who were ancestors of the Talbot Earls of Shrewsbury at Alton
in Staffordshire. The Talbot family, with one descent through the female line,
retained the house until it was given to the National Trust in 1944.

Examination of the cloisters shows various phases of building. When a fan vaulted
ceiling was built the new arches were not in synchrony with the earlier ones
and would have required a column in front of a door. The column was omitted
leading to the improbable result shown in my photograph. The former nunnery
buildings were used in filming Harry Potter.

The photographs of the exterior of the house show two Oriel windows. One of
these was the subject of William Henry Fox Talbot's first photographic experiments.

Sources:

National Trust information boards at the abbey.St. Cyriac's Church, Lacock, Wiltshire, a booklet available in the church
prepared by the Friends of Lacock with photographs by Sue Ferris, Paul Freeland,
Roger Robilliard and Oliver Menhinick, published in 2003, ISBN 1 903025 14 1
Late Mediaeval England, a course of six weekends at Wedgwood Memorial College,
Winter 2004/5, by James Bond and Mike Higginbottom.